Donate money to charities, not to beggars

We all want people to work, not beg. Working is productive; begging is at best neutral and often a burden and a nuisance. There is no guarantee that the beggar who receives the money will spend it in ways that increase the quality of his life. He might well spend the money on alcohol or drugs.

• Few coins that we give to a beggar, doesn't make begging a lucrative activity and promotes laziness.
• Giving money to beggars, you are helping the wrong people.
• Think in social context: if I don’t help the beggar, who will? 
• You are likely to give your money to the beggars who already get the most from other givers. Like everyone else, you are also likely to give the most money to the ones with the locations, looks, and tricks that prompt people to give.
• If you give money to beggars on impulse, chances are that you end up giving to wrong people but not to the poor men and women whose appearances have less power to elicit sympathy and guilt in passers by and who occupy less favorable spots in the city.
• The vast majority of beggars living in the developed world have a quality of life that millions in the developing world can only dream of. 
• If our aim is to benefit ourselves, then giving money to beggars is sub optimal. If our aim is to benefit others, then giving money to beggars is also sub optimal. Either way, giving money to beggars is wasteful.

In seeking to help others, we should not merely give to those who are geographically close to us and whose appearance elicits our sympathy. Rather, we should give to those who are the worst off, who can be helped the most, and who are the least responsible for the situation that they’re in. To achieve this, we should (i) consciously decide how much of our money we are willing to spend on helping others, (ii) find the most efficient charity, (iii) donate money to that charity, and (iv) say no the next time a beggar asks if we can spare a dime.

Aid should go where it will help most.

Beggars are very unfortunate lot deprived of wealth, health, nutritious food, shelter, clothes, education and almost everything we are blessed with. Expecting from the beggars things which we and our friends doesn't follow in day to day living is height of hypocrisy and speaks poorly about our empathetic abilities. Dropping coin into the beggar's bowl and expecting divine results is stupidity. Dropping few coins in beggars bowl neither makes receiver rich nor impoverishes the giver. Hence dropping coin in beggars bowl must not be analysed too much. Just give and forget. By dropping few coins, we are not doing any great thing or any reason for the beggar to be grateful. Beggars have no right to create any kind of public nuisance.